Fun and games in Santiago

Having returned to the realms of the free hostel breakfast, and had an early night, I was up in time for morning feeding. To be honest, I needn’t really have bothered – yep, the odd bit of toast and jam, and tea and coffee which I don’t drink, is scarcely worth the extra hour or so’s sleep. Still, having awakened, I had more time to converse with some of my room-mates.

Kyle, to whom I’d chatted briefly the night before, is an American and is cycling from Tierra del Fuego back up to the US, the whole length of South America. This is the kind of ambition which I totally respect whilst knowing 100% that there is no way in hell I would ever do anything similar. He’d cycled in from Valparaiso that day, and was planning to rest up and chill out in the city for a few days while he waited for this partner in pedals, who was still in Valparaiso, on the coast.

Georg, who was checking out that morning, is from Osnabruck in the north of Germany, fairly near Hamburg, which has been one of the British Army’s main garrison towns in Germany since World War Two. Whilst studying in Hamburg for his Master’s in International Relations, he had taken time to study in Buenos Aires, and was now doing a bit of travelling to round off the trip. He spoke exceedingly good English, but was interested in having a chat as he regards conversing with native English as being the best way to polish around the edges of his language skills.

So, we headed off up the road, through the Bellavista neighbourhood to the foot of Cerro San Cristobal (St Christopher’s Hill), where I prevailed upon him to take the funicular up to the top. The views from there were generally great, although marred somewhat by the rather obvious smog hanging over parts of the city – this is a regular problem for Santiago, as the air gets trapped by the surrounding mountains. So we passed an enjoyable hour or so talking about travel, Germany, football, beer and the other usual small-talk that might be expected, then headed back down and grabbed a lunch at one of the numerous bar/restaurants along Pio Nono before Georg had to get his bus.

I then headed off to explore a little of the city, going for a wander past the Palacio de Moneda, the home of Chile’s President, around the Plaza de la Constitucion, over to the Plaza de Armas, the site of Santiago’s Catedral, and back through the Parque Forestal along by the Rio Mapocho. Well, they call it a river, anyway. Through that part of the city, its course is enclosed by concrete, and the river runs along only a part of that, a murky brown colour and smelling somewhat akin to an open sewer at times. Not as picturesque as it might be…

Having had an explore for a bit, I popped back to the hostel for a siesta, then treated myself to a few cervezas artesanales up on the hostel’s rather pleasant roof terrace. Whilst the Capital brewery’s Pale Ale and Amber Ale were reasonable but nothing too special, the Cross brewery’s Golden Ale was most enjoyable. Cheered by good beer and a view of the sunset, I headed over to the local Metro station to meet up with Agnieszka, who regular readers may well remember as the Polish lass I met whilst in El Calafate (and who was complicit in my excessive consumption the evening before my departure from the city…)

As noted before, Aga is studying in Maastricht in the Netherlands, and as part of her degree is in Santiago on exchange. By this point, having done her pre-study travelling, she was settling in ready for her courses – indeed, she had just moved into her flat that day. We had quite a pleasant dinner at a little restaurant called Venezia on Pio Nono which, despite the name, had almost no connection with Italy, culinary or otherwise. I had the Congrio, a local fish which I believe is basically a conger eel, with pure picante, which is spicy mashed potato. Though I really didn’t think it was particularly spicy, and gleefully added chilli sauce. Aga meanwhile had some chicken, accompanied by possibly the strongest caipiroska I’ve ever encountered in my life. She ended up asking for extra ice, lemon and sugar, and turning it into two drinks, both of which were still very strong! Having thus recharged our batteries, we headed on to meet up with some of Aga’s fellow exchange students, who were also out drinking in Bellavista, a mixed bag of Germans, Finns and a Frenchman, along with a scattering of Chileans, with whome we passed a fun few hours’ drinking.